Adopt a Dune
If you are already participating in the Bay to Dunes program, consider following it up with the Adopt a Dune Service Learning program! Bring your students out 2-4 times during the year to remove invasive plants on their very own adopted dune. Classes learn more about native and invasive species in the dunes, and help restore their dune to its natural state. As part of this service-learning program, we ask participating classes to supplement their restoration work with classroom activities, such as reflection journals or art projects.
Adopt a Dune field trips are offered on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and last approximately 2 hours, start to finish. Classes are led by trained volunteers. This is a free field trip and bus funding is available too! Interested? Call Maggie at 444-1397 or email maggie@friendsofthedunes.org.
Adopt-a-Dune began in 2003 with two 3rd grade classrooms from Jacoby Creek School participating in removal of European beachgrass from the Manila Dunes. After first attending a Bay to Dunes fieldtrip, classrooms then have the option of returning several times throughout the school year to their "adopted dune" to remove beachgrass. Thus they see changes over time as invasive plants are removed and native plants begin to re-inhabit the dunes. This restoration experience is incorporated into the curriculum of the students when they create "wanted posters" for invasive plants, write letters describing why the project is important to them, and write in reflection journals about their experience. Of course there is also the all important who can get the longest root contest, and the biggest pile of grass.
We asked Catherine Girard, a teach at Jacoby Creek School who has been a great help in the creation and promotion of the Adopt-a-Dune program what her class gets out of the experience.
"I think the most important thing is that they come away believing that they are really making a difference. This is the first time many of these kids have experienced that feeling. They have a sense that they are powerful, and they say things like "if we all work together, we can really make big changes." Adopt-a-Dune is very visual; it’s very concrete for them. They learn about change over time, and they are truly shocked by how much it changes and how they really do make a difference. They also begin to feel connected to their environment. They call it "our dune," and many of them take their parents out to visit the dunes. One student told her mother she wants to be a restorationist when she grows up.